When I was in eighth grade I had a pretty nondescript English class.
It was not too fun or boring and the teacher was okay but not great
and there I was passing time when I got sat next to the most perfect
woman I had ever met. She was cute, and sassy, and funny and I was
instantly and deeply in love. The only real problem was that she was
co cute and cool that I was not the only one who was in love so I had
lots of competition. Well, competition may be a strong word to use
here because I, in retrospect, had no chance. I would try and make
sure we worked on projects together and that we were conveniently at
the same places and she was great always really nice and fun but
always just about shop-girl friendly and no more. I called her to
talk a couple of times over the summer and she was always willing to
have a chat and she would laugh at all the right spots but then she
would say something horrible like, 'I have to go and get ready, my
boyfriend is coming over soon.'
'Damn your boyfriend, damn him to hell, you know you love me and not
him.' I would say in a defiant manly voice in my head after she hung
up the phone and I was going to be all alone and she was going to be
with her much cooler, older and better looking boyfriend.
When we went back to ninth grade she was in two of my classes and
came and sat by me on purpose and was always really nice which made
it even worse. One day she came up to me in the hall before class and
asked if I wanted to sluff (Payson slang for skipping school that is
not in wide usage elsewhere) class and go to her house to hang out. I
tried to play it cool but accepting an invitation to what very well
be my chance to make out with the girl of my dreams I may have been
over eager and it made her giggle a little and she said 'okay then'
in a take-it-easy-buddy kind of tone. I was expecting to just leave
with her and walk the mile or so to her house but then something
catastrophic happened, other people were coming. Rule number 1 of
making out is: no other people. What is worse is one of those other
people, a sweet girl but not my type, was into me and was maybe
thinking that she and I were going to get together. My euphoria
melted into a thick surely glob in my stomach and I was considerably
less cheerful. After we left the school and started goofing off and
walking I was cheerful again and ready to have fun when we got to my
friends house no one knew what to do to pass the time so I offered to
cook up a batch of my homemade caramel that I could make from
scratch. A trick my brother and I had perfected by necessity because
we often lacked the funds for huge gobs of commercially produced fat
and sugar. I boiled up the caramel while everyone talked around the
kitchen bar and we all joked and had lots of fun. I poured out the
sugar goop onto a cookie sheet and everyone got spoonfuls and ate it
still warm. There have been many good days in my life but there are
many many worse then skipping school to eat caramel with my crush and
our friends when we should have been learning about U.S. History. We
goofed off too long and I had to run as fast as I could back to the
school to make it to the bus home in time and I just made it.
